Richard W Moats

US Patent:

20030190599, Oct 9, 2003

Filed:

Apr 4, 2002

Appl. No.:

10/116348

Inventors:

Richard Moats - Annandale VA, US
Brian Sullivan - Redondo Beach CA, US

International Classification:

C12Q001/70
G01N033/53
G01N033/537
G01N033/543
G06F019/00
G01N033/48
G01N033/50

US Classification:

435/005000, 435/007920, 702/019000, 435/007100

Abstract:

The existence of any one of Nbioagents in a sample, N being an integer greater than 1, may be quickly determined in two major steps: (1) performing N separate ELISA processes (e.g. Test , Test , and Test , where N=3) on portions of the sample concurrently to identify (INDIC. A) a group of N bioagents that contain the bioagent, each of the N separate ELISA processes is capable of identifying the presence of a bioagent that falls within a unique group of N bioagents and in which the bioagents detectable by any one of those processes is different from the bioagents that are detectable by any other of the N processes. Then, when a test shows positive, performing N additional ELISA processes (e.g. Test , Test & Test , where N=3) on portions of the sample concurrently to identify (INDIC. B) the particular bioagent. Each of the latter N processes is capable of only identifying a respective one of the individual bioagents that form the group of N bioagents identified in the previous step.